


Finish What You Started

by BerityBaker



Series: Eddie Kaspbrak is Alive, Motherfuckers [1]
Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Death Fix, Coming Out, Confessions, Eddie Kaspbrak Lives, Fix-It, Heart-to-Heart, IT Chapter Two Spoilers, Love Confessions, M/M, Movie: IT Chapter Two, POV Richie Tozier, The Kissing Bridge (IT)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-07
Updated: 2019-09-07
Packaged: 2020-10-12 02:40:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20556851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BerityBaker/pseuds/BerityBaker
Summary: After killing It, Richie wants to show Eddie something he never thought he would get the chance to.(Within lie Chapter Two spoilers and a couple book references.)





	Finish What You Started

**Author's Note:**

> Let's pretend Eddie almost died just like Richie almost died in the book. Because Chapter Two broke me, despite that glorious Reddie canon. So, Eddie definitely didn't get stabbed by It, right? He was just tossed aside like a ragdoll and hit his head. Because it's easier for all of us that way.

Richie stands in the hallway at the Derry Town House, picking at his already bleeding cuticles and having the same argument he’s had with himself a thousand times since the night before, which is itself a variation on the same argument he had with himself a million times as a teenager.

_You’ve killed a man. You’ve traipsed through the sewers. You’ve crushed a clown-monster’s still-beating heart in your bare hands_, he tells himself.

_You had help, though_, his anxiety replies, thoroughly uncooperative, as usual.

_What have you got to lose at this point?_ he counters.

_The same thing you almost lost already. Only this way it would be so much worse._

_Just do it, you dumb fuck_, his rational side grumbles, and before the nerves can butt in again, he raises his hand to knock on Eddie’s door.

He never gets the chance, though, because right at that moment, the man himself opens it, jumps backward at the sight of someone on the other side, and presses a hand to his heaving chest. “Jesus, Richie,” he mutters. There’s a fresh patch of gauze taped to his cheek, and his hair is soft, like it’s just dried from a shower. “What’s up?”

Richie bites back whatever treasonous joke was bubbling in his throat and says, “Sorry. Didn’t mean to startle you.”

Eddie grins reluctantly. “Don’t apologize. It sounds weird coming from you.”

Richie raises his eyebrows. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means you’re a little shit, Tozier. And you’ve always been a little shit.”

“You’ve got some nerve calling _me_ a ‘little shit,’” Richie shoots back.

“Shut _up_, five-nine is average,” Eddie says, but he smiles gently. “Really, though, what’s up?”

Richie looks at a spot on the wall over Eddie’s shoulder for entirely too long. “I’ve got something to show you.”

“Okay.”

“But first, where are you going?”

“I don’t really have plans. I was just gonna take a walk. See what else has changed around town. Now that…you know. It’s dead, and all. You can come with me if you want.”

“I wanted to show you something in town, anyway.”

Eddie takes a brand-new, burgundy jacket from the hook by the door and pulls it on as he comes all the way out into the hallway.

“When the hell did you have time to go shopping?” Richie asks, plucking the shoulder playfully as they start down the stairs.

“I didn’t. It’s a spare.”

Richie snorts. “Right. Risk assessment,” he reminds himself out loud.

“Listen, I’m not gonna get a fucking cold just because one jacket gets torn or drenched or left in the sewer—_thanks_, by the way.”

“I saved your life and you’re complaining that I left your goddamn jacket behind?” Richie says, incredulous. “When you had a _spare_?”

“They discontinued it last fall.” Stepping out into the sunlight, Eddie turns to him. “I’ll never get that jacket back.”

Richie throws a jovial arm around his shoulders and steers him down the sidewalk, in the direction of the canal. “Things change, Eds. You can’t keep ’em the same by marrying your mother.”

Eddie balks. “How do you—?”

“Facebook, man. Myra is a dead ringer for Mrs. K. It’s eerie.”

Eddie puts his face in his hands, but keeps walking, only able to do so with Richie’s guidance. For all his talk about potential hazards to his health, he sure is surprisingly trusting. Finally, he looks up again, and Richie’s surprised to see him grinning sheepishly. He’s even more surprised when he starts laughing hysterically. “I called her ‘Mommy.’”

“What?”

“The last time I spoke to Myra, right before I got Mike’s call. I called her ‘Mommy’ by accident.”

“Kinky,” Richie snorts.

“Fuck you.”

“No, that’s your wife’s job. Since she’s your mom.”

Eddie doesn’t speak for a moment. He stares at the concrete two feet in front of them. “Two days ago I didn’t even realize how messed up my life was,” he says quietly. “Now it’s even worse.”

His tone breaks Richie’s heart, and for perhaps the billionth time, he questions whether talking to Eddie was a good idea after all. “What do you mean?”

“I mean I didn’t even tell her where I was going, let alone why. I just packed my bags and ran out the door.” He grins, but it’s bitter. “Just like I did with my mom when we went to Neibolt the second time. Before we fought It.”

“To be fair, you didn’t really know why,” Richie points out, because as much as he loves to rag on him, he hates the sadness that has collected in the lines on Eddie’s face over the past few decades. “You could call her right now,” he adds, because _fuck, why not! You’re a hero now, Richie-boy, beep-beep and do the right thing, you goddamn saint!_

Eddie eyes him suspiciously. “Why are you being so nice?” he says.

“You almost died, shitbrain. I’m not allowed to be nice?”

“You’re Richie, of course you’re not.”

“Fine, then. Be an idiot and don’t call your m—I mean, wife.” He’s put on his most impish grin, but he’s never felt more out of sync with his own face.

Eddie pulls out his phone, unlocks and re-locks it three times, then says, “You don’t mind?”

“Not at all. Put it on speaker so I can see if she _sounds_ like your mom, too.”

He shoots Richie a look and unlocks it one more time, stopping to dial her. Richie stops a few paces ahead, glancing around at the various businesses that line the street, new and old. Despite his teasing, he pretends not to listen when Myra picks up. He can faintly hear her shouting, fearful and angry, from his vantage point three feet away.

“Myra, I’m sorry, I…uh-huh…yeah, I get that, I just…Mommy, lis—”

When Richie’s head whips around Eddie’s whole face matches his jacket. They lock eyes, Richie trying not to laugh, Eddie utterly mortified.

“You really _did_ do it!” Richie hisses. Eddie shushes him.

“I know…I’m sorry, I just—yeah, okay…Myra—”

“You just called your wife ‘Mommy’ _again_!”

A teenager passing by looks up from her phone, perplexed, then rolls her eyes and keeps moving.

Eddie puts a hand to the receiver and mouths, “_beep-beep, asshole_” before nodding and saying, “Yes, Myra, I know I hurt you. I’m sorry.”

After that, it almost looks like he’s given up. His eyes droop closed and his mouth turns down at the corners, and Richie thinks it might be the most pitiful thing he’s ever seen, a grown man standing on the sidewalk in his hometown next to his childhood friend, getting screamed at by his wife on the phone. The crease between Eddie’s eyebrows grows deeper by the second, and just when Richie thinks it might actually stay there for good, Eddie speaks again, cutting across the rant.

“Myra, I want a divorce.”

There’s silence on the line for what feels like an eternity, while Richie stares wide-eyed at his own feet. _Holy shit_, is all his brain can come up with, and it takes every bit of will he has left to keep from saying it out loud.

Then the screaming starts again, this time more panicked, more frantic. Richie still can’t make out what she’s saying, but he’s kind of glad, now.

“I know it’s not fair….Yes, I know you love me. I love you too….I don’t know why, Myra, I just can’t…”

Richie looks up at the sky with his hands in his pockets, pursing his lips as if whistling.

“Okay. I’ll talk to you later.” Eddie hangs up on his wife mid-curse. He sighs heavily, shoves his phone back into his pocket, and runs his hands through his hair, putting it at wild angles. “Holy fuck.”

“Holy fuck, indeed.” Richie’s still too stunned to say anything else. The phone starts buzzing again, but they both ignore it.

“I can’t believe those words came out of my mouth,” Eddie wheezes, then reaches for the inhaler in his other pocket before remembering it’s not there anymore and looking up at Richie with wide eyes. “Oh my god. Oh my god.”

Richie, now in a panic himself, puts his hands on Eddie’s shoulders and says, “Eds. Eds, you alright?”

Eddie nods twice, then shakes his head vehemently.

“Calm down, señor,” Richie says in his good old Pancho Vanilla Voice, the one Eddie liked the most when they were kids. Or, at least, the one he was least outwardly annoyed by. He keeps his hands on his shoulders, drumming his fingers rhythmically without really thinking about it.

“Shut up, Richie,” Eddie murmurs between shallow breaths.

“You’re a stah, kid, but cha gotta learn to breathe or yeh nevah gonna make it,” Richie continues, switching to some kind of half-baked sleazy old-Hollywood agent Voice he’s never tried before.

“You’re a fucking idiot,” Eddie says, but it’s working. He’s not struggling so hard to breathe, anymore. “You can’t cure an asthma attack with impressions.”

Neither of them speaks for a while, and Eddie’s breathing slowly returns to its normal tempo.

“I think I just did, amigo.”

“Shut up, Richie,” Eddie repeats. After a moment, they both burst out laughing.

“Let’s get going, Eds. We’re burning daylight.”

He rolls his eyes. “It’s not even noon.”

“Pip, pip! Let’s ge’ a move-un!”

He rolls his eyes again, but he follows when Richie starts walking. “What did you want to show me?”

Richie almost stops in his tracks, but instead manages to get away with tripping over his own feet. Eddie catches his shoulder before he can really start to fall. “It can wait. Let’s just keep walking. We’re headed in the right direction, anyway.” If Eddie realizes which direction that is, he doesn’t acknowledge it.

They’re almost to the park, where the shell-shaped stage and that dumb fucking statue sit, casting their shadows in the mid-morning sunlight. “Did I tell you about that one?” Richie says. “Good ol’ Paul over there tried to kill me.”

“No kidding,” Eddie says, like it made sense. Of course, it does make sense to _them_, but he says it like Richie had just told him they were rebooting _Jaws_.

“Yeah, when we were kids. I had just come out of the arcade because Henry—”

When he stops, Eddie cocks his head. “Yeah?”

“Because Henry was being a psychotic dick.”

“When was he _not_ a psychotic dick?” Eddie says, confused.

Richie purses his lips, then he closes his eyes and sighs. “I guess there’s more to it than that. He and those other guys…they…”

Suddenly, Eddie looks furious. “Why didn’t I know about this? We always had each other’s backs when Bowers and his crew came after us.”

“It was when we weren’t talking to each other. After…after you broke your arm.”

“Oh.” He unconsciously twists his wrist, as if making sure it had, in fact, healed all those years ago. “But why didn’t you tell us about it after? When we started hanging out again?”

“Well, it was because…I was scared.”

Eddie blinks. “Scared of what?”

“What you guys might think.”

It’s a long time before Eddie says, “Us? The _Losers_?”

“Yeah. He called me…um…”

“We’ve all been called every name in the book. You can say it.”

“Well, let’s just say Bowers was never the sharpest tool, but he was blunt enough to hit the nail right on the head.”

Eddie still looks lost.

Richie takes pity on him and mumbles, so quickly it’s almost unintelligible, “I like guys, Eds.”

“You…oh.”

“And he called me on it in front of everybody. And I couldn’t even deny it. Because it was true. So I just ran.” Richie sighs and looks back up at the statue. “I ended up here getting chased by a tourist trap.”

Eddie swallows audibly, and Richie looks over to see him staring at the statue, too. “You know, I didn’t tell you guys everything about the leper, either.”

Richie, still drawing himself out of the awful memory of Henry in his face, shouting out the secret nobody else was supposed to know, that he hardly even understood himself, barely hears his own voice say, “What?”

“The leper. It didn’t just chase me, when I was a kid. He talked, too.”

Now Eddie has his full attention. “What did it say?”

His lips are a tight line until he says, “It offered to give me a blowjob.”

“You should have taken it.”

“Beep beep, Richie.”

“Sorry.”

“I mean, I was scared of all the disease and shit—”

“Duh,” Richie interrupts

“Can you shut up for a second?”

“Right, sorry,” he says again. “I’m just coming off the high of coming out to my first…good friend.”

“I didn’t want that walking infection anywhere near me, but I don’t think that was all there was to it.”

Richie bites the inside of his cheek, lost in thought. “So…”

“I like guys, too, Richie.”

Richie stares at him for a long time, at a complete loss for words.

“So what was it you wanted to show me? Is it around here?”

Richie blinks a few times and shakes his head a little. “Yeah. I mean, no, but…just follow me.”

He leads the way, the weight in the pit of his stomach condensing the closer they come to the Kissing Bridge. His breath hitches when he sees the spot where he knelt in the summer of 1989, with the knife his dad had given him, scratching the whitewashed, graffitied fence with his own initial, followed by an innocuous plus sign and a slightly less innocuous _E_. He hadn’t even scratched the second letter hard enough to remove the paint, but it was still there, faintly, even twenty-seven years later.

“This is it,” he says, his usual bravado giving way to exhaustion.

Eddie glances from one fencepost to another, then back up at Richie. “What am I looking at?”

Richie points in the vague direction of his carving, and Eddie sees it immediately.

“I don’t…Richie, is that us?”

“Yeah,” he whispers. He can barely find his breath, and wonders whether Eddie’s got a spare inhaler hiding somewhere in his room at the Town House. “I got top billing,” he jokes weakly.

Eddie stares at it. “I don’t remember this. When did we do this?”

Startled, Richie takes a step back. “Of course you don’t remember it. I did it alone.”

“You…did I ask you to or something?” Eddie took his own step back.

“No, I…look, I don’t know why I wanted to show this to you. Let’s just g—”

He can’t get out the rest of the word, because suddenly there’s another mouth in the way.

Eddie kisses him, and Richie doesn’t know why all his muscles have frozen. Shouldn’t they be melting, letting him wrap his arms around Eddie’s shoulders and tangle his hands in his hair? He wants to—_God_, does he want to—but his neurons aren’t firing fast enough. For the first time in his life, Richie Tozier’s brain has slowed to a near halt, and he wonders: is this what it’s supposed to be like? Kissing your first love? He never got the chance when he was younger; was he catching up now?

When the kiss breaks, the spell it cast over Richie breaks as well, and every nerve screams about pulling Eddie back in, so that’s what happens. Almost of their own accord, his fingers grasp the sides of Eddie’s T-shirt and his arms yank backward, and they’re kissing again, only this time Richie is kissing back, kissing back like he’s never kissed anyone. He’s careful of the left side of Eddie’s face, and Eddie doesn’t move much, for fear of slamming his nose into Richie’s glasses. Richie’s arms do finally wrap around Eddie’s shoulders, and Eddie’s are tight around his middle, squeezing what little air had been left by the kiss itself out of his lungs as if he was trying to simulate the suffocating feeling of an asthma attack.

Richie pulls back just enough to speak, but keeps his eyes closed, his forehead resting against Eddie’s. “This is wrong.”

Eddie tenses in his arms. “What the fuck do you mean, ‘this is wrong’?”

“You’re a married man.”

Richie opens his eyes and sees Eddie’s trained on him. This close together, and with his glasses all fogged up, it’s impossible to really tell, but he seems to be glaring at him. “That is _so_ not funny.”

“Get used to it, Eds.”

“I already am, asshole.” Eddie’s arms drop to his sides. “Do you have a knife?”

Richie hands over his rental car keys, the closest thing he’s got. “What for?”

Eddie kneels down next to their initials and starts scratching at the faint _E_. “I’m finishing what you couldn’t.”

“You want to talk about finishing—”

“If you’re going to make a joke about fucking my mother, you should seriously reconsider.”

“Oh? Why’s that?”

“You carved our initials on the Kissing Bridge.” His tongue sticks out between his teeth as he peels away the paint. Then he stands up and puts a finger under Richie’s chin. “I don’t want you to hide behind those kinds of jokes anymore.”

“What kind of jokes am I supposed to hide behind, then?”

“Besides, it’s my job,” Eddie continues, ignoring him.

Richie raises an eyebrow. “Fucking me or fucking your mother?”

Eddie shakes his head, which prompts Richie to flick his nose, which in turn leads to Eddie stealing Richie’s glasses right off his face and sprinting back toward town.

Richie chases him, careful not to fall over anything, and catches him in the park with a flying tackle that should have killed them both, at their age. Which is how he ends up with Eddie Kaspbrak pinned on the fresh-cut grass, kissing him gently next to a group of young teenagers picnicking and paying them no mind beyond a glance and a grin.

**Author's Note:**

> Witness my Chapter Two meltdown (@[allisonthe13th](https://twitter.com/allisonthe13th)) and all my book meltdowns (@[catcherin221b](https://twitter.com/catcherin221b)) on Twitter.


End file.
